"This is a good time of year to be snug in the barn," Rose Magnolia
Yesterday we put the heifers up the hill so they wouldn't repeat Tuesday's adventure when the milk tanker picked up. (Someone insisted...might have been me.) While I was standing in the snowy sunshine being a fence, I bird watched....one of the best perks of this job is being able to bird watch while working....chickadees in the calf yard, starlings down in the barn eaves, tree sparrows and dark-eyed juncos working through the bushes. A gold finch sitting boldly in the tip of a box elder branch, soaking up the sun much like I was. I glanced up at a flock of what I thought were starlings, winging west in a hurry.
Wait a minute! White britches, russet breasts, chocolate brown bodies hurtling by...a whole double decade of winter robins right over my head. I thought I heard one in the honey locust last week, but I dismissed it as a downy woodpecker. I know quite a number of them winter over up here in chilly northern climes, but I am always delighted to see them.
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5 comments:
Cute cowlick!
Rose Magnolia does look snug. Makes you wonder why the heifers keep trying to run away, doesn't it? Kids! You have a wonderful variety of birds around your place. I wonder how long robins and bluebirds have been wintering here in the north. I've been seeing them for more than a dozen years, but I don't remember ever seeing them during winter when I was a kid. Which was a long, long time ago!
Pretty name for such a pretty face. Hard to believe there's any 'ornery' behind those brown eyes ;0)
I've not seen robins in northwest Ohio, but over the holidays we did delight in watching flocks of them working the crab apples on my brother's trees in central Ohio.
It does the heart good. I threw some raisins I'd chopped and soaked under those same trees. My hubby said he saw the robins enjoying them.
Rose Magnolia has a whole lot of "Awwww, how cute!" factor built into her.
It's always a pleasant surprise to come across a flock of what we think of as "summer" birds in the middle of winter. Especially when we think they only eat worms and bugs out of the pasture and lawn that are now frozen solid if not covered with feet of snow!
We always forget that the robin is an omnivore and will eat things like berries and rose hips as well as worms. I've seen hundreds in farm hedgerows as they go after the dried up fruit of multiflora rose and wild grapes.
Nita, she is a pistol, that one
WW, they are just like kids...always doing foolish things. We do have an amazing array of birds. I so wish our farm was included in a count circle, because pretty much any day of the year we could make a good showing. We see robins and BBs too, although not as often right here at home. Usually have to go across the river for them
Cathy, Cool that the robins would eat raisins. We haven't tried that. Ralph's mom used to give the mockingbirds currants, but I can't get them to come in for them.
Joated, there is just something about them. I know it is not unusual for them to stay north. There is almost always a large flock on the north side of the river, foraging along the road, year round, and we often get blue birds on the Christmas count, yet I still get excited every time I see one outside summer. lol
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